The European Sphere

we are dealing with the very first instance of an accommodation of sovereign nation states – moreover, the first generation of particularly self-confident nation states with their own imperial pasts – to the postnational constellation of an emerging world society...

The Pimpernel Poet of the British Library

Almost as soon as Vera Frankl finished editing The Best Read Office, our programme about the readers at the British Library, I was back at my Humanities One desk being asked by the woman opposite me if I had written the poem left on her desk whilst she took a break. I hadn't.

But someone had.

Now, more evidence: a reader (well known) from Rare Books privately tweets today - what about the Rogue Sonnet Flirt?

Her poem was about a part of her anatomy, said to be rather good; it too was left on her desk while she was absent. Perhaps if we are lucky we may one day see it. So today I begin my investigation of the Rogue Sonnet Flirt. A.K.A

#PimpernellPoet

Where I am writing Betwixt - and why it's so slow

That's the Euston road in sunnier times (2011). And a few yards away is this

Which is the British Library. On Saturday the Radio 4 documentary I made with Vera Frankl about some of the readers at the British Library is broadcast. Details here. It's called The Best Read Office in the World. Listen in at 10.30am, or anytime on Iplayer.

A Poem

A SMALL POEM FOR VLISSINGEN

Zo de wind waait, waait z’n jasje 

As the wind blows, so does his jacket 

(i.e. He will jump on any bandwagon)

Dutch Proverb

To light a cigarette with a candle 

Kills a sailor, they say, in Vlissingen: 

Aan kust sea and sky dance a light tango, 

Ships now close sail for a pale horizon 

Where tobacco can be smoked any way.

Found Flushing Photos

Maybe Tom? Sailing for where? Flushing 2011

London - conversations with horses

"Nietzsche believed that 'only thoughts which come from walking have any value'. And look what happened to him, seething till his eyes popped out, conversations with horses."

Iain Sinclair, London Orbital, pp31 (2002)